You oughta find somethin' real to focus on fer a change, Roscoe. The world don't give a hoot about yer 46 of K. Now if you was to invent a better mousetrap or find a way to cure male pattern baldness, then you'd be onto somethin' worth yammerin' about.

Last night I whipped up a batch of the most delicious chocolate chip and chopped walnut cookies you have ever seen.

There are some virtues in the world that somehow manage to transcend all the ugliness, brutishness, and psychotic hatred the world can throw, and surely high among these virtues is the smell and taste of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies.

Not in the chocolate business any more, so I won't be making chocolate chip cookies again any time soon. But I have a loaf of bread rising to use for open face hot turkey and gravy sandwiches this evening.

And be glad I don't start making up false tales about how Gluon sold his aging mother and his poor sister Pinche' Cavron into a life of slavery and sin on the streets of old Chihauhua. ;-) I'm just not that nasty, you see. I respect your fictional characters and I wish them well and would certainly not dream of meddling in their lives in so capricious and hurtful a manner.

First of all, LH, the discontinuity in your idea is too silly to mention. The word you were looking for is Cabron, and there is no rhyme or reason to assume Gluon would have a sibling of any sort, being a subatomic particle sort of guy, let alone one with a Spanish name. Chinga, contrariwise, is a perfectly good street name, and resonates nicely with Chongo, and her desperate fall into houses of ill-repute is perfectly consistent with his into the dark underbelly of criminal types in Chicago. These things have to be done with style, see? It don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing, as my pal Duke useter say.

Anyway, I already agreed to stop injecting Chinga's story into things, and here you are revving the whole thing up again!! Wassamaddah you?

My condolences to Chongo on the passing of his long-time friend and mentor, Frankie "the Breeze", who passed away in Chicago recently. I am sure C. is all at sixes and sevens wondering which way to turn now.

Oh, look, someone filled the bird feeder, there are vultures hopping around the yard. Who found the roadkill bison? (Whoever must have had gluon pick it up and deliver it 'cause the front-end loader is still in the shop.)

Matter of fact, Amos, Chongo and his friends in the Chicago Police force as well as many of his civilian primate buddies have been toasting the death of the late and unlamented Frankie Breeze in a celebratory fashion. No one seems to mourn his passing! I wonder why? ;-) You have indeed been restraining yourself on the Chinga stuff lately, and it is appreciated. I was just reminding you and Rap of the Golden Rule as regards other people's fictional characters. Nothing more than that. Keep Rap in mind. He is utterly shameless, and must be chided for it now and then or he might become even more incorrigible than he is already.

Now, here's a paradox. Rapp insists that all of us are HIS invented characters. So that means he is the only one who can be messed with by us, as the others are all his fictional characters. On the other hand it is a truism that such Gods, as Rapp presents himself to be, are artifacts of human creativity and therefore fictional characters. Therefore he is off-limits himself, being a fictional deity. But if that is the case his assertion that we are fictional characters is also, itself, a fiction and therefore discountable so we can proceed to mess with each other and inject our creativity into our threads of each others' lives. But that means, I am entitled to inject imaginary content into Little Hawk's time-stream, which would include making sisters for his created chimpanzee. Maybe all this is too confusing, and we should just have a free-for-all.

Maybe we should forget about trying to figure it out and just spend more time playing our fine guitars. You have a Martin and an Appolonio, don't you? That's an embarrassment of riches! I am similarly embarrassed, with a Martin HD-28 and an Avalon guitar I bought from Lynn Miles after she'd been playing it in concerts all over the world for at least the last 6 years. Yeesh! What an incredible guitar it is...it has amazing clarity.

As for Lynn, she's simply THE finest songwriter around as far as I'm concerned. You may not know about her, but do an Internet search and you'll find her easily enough on Youtube, Myspace, and elsewhere. She's a veteran folksinger and songwriter from the Ottawa area in Canada...is about 10 years younger than you and I (I would assume, in your case).

Here's a photo of her and the guitar from Avalon's website:

http://www.avalonguitars.com/artists/lynn_miles.php

And here's her website:

http://www.lynnmilesmusic.com/

When it comes to both songwriting and the performing of those songs, I'd rather go to see a Lynn Miles show than see Bob Dylan, Leonard Cohen, or any other performer or band that I can think of...so having the guitar she played onstage for the better part of the last 10 years is kind of like unexpectedly becoming the owner of the Holy Grail.

"Mr. Calabrese, an especially vicious member of the Chicago organized crime family known as the Outfit, was serving a life sentence after his conviction, with four other men, on racketeering charges in September 2007 in what became known as the Family Secrets trial.

The trial was the result of years of federal investigation aimed at weakening the Outfit and clearing 18 unsolved murder cases dating to the 1970s. A jury found Mr. Calabrese the perpetrator of seven of the murders, but at a sentencing hearing in January 2009, Judge James Zagel of Federal District Court, by his own reading of the evidence, held him responsible for six additional killings."

Fuckin sick shit. Never used to happen in my Canada until the RCMP got their wings clipped under Mulroney. Before that, the fuckers were kept marginal. Now, the mafiaSSS... Italian, Greek, Asian, Bikers, and more... ply their shit "openly" - fer fuck sake! We got a strip club across the street from Moncton High School! How sick is that shit?

Harper tells us killing people 8000 miles away is a good thing because these people we SHOULD kill denigrate and subjugate women but the fucker allows this same fuckin shit across the street from a high school in Moncton, NB? WWWWWWTF?

Your rant may vary. Void where apathy is... well, there are so many choices, eh?

Sorry... that rant doesn't belong here in this thread. But, I am postin it anyway.

Agreed, gnu. As for as I'm concerned, Canada has been given over to USA corporate/military-industrial interests by both Brian Mulroney and Stephen Harper. We see the damage all around us, and it keeps getting worse. They might as well have been appointed directly by Washington's insider lobbyists to do their bidding, rather than elected by Canadian citizens. The one place that seems deliriously happy about it is Alberta, our very own version of Texas in the Northland.

But, hey, I'd much rather talk about great guitars. Know what I mean? I can get some pleasure and satisfaction from a good guitar.

We are in SLC. We go home on the 10 a.m. bus tomorrow morn. My MIL is still dying and we may have to return to Merry Land within the next two weeks...but who can tell?

Amos, LH -- you don't have Martins. Those are actually plastic guitars from Sears. I just make you think that they are Martins. A Martin is not, really, a guitar, but a bohran. The Martin company only makes 'rans. And that Apolowhosis is actually a toy ukelele that plays "Polly Wolly Doodle" when you turn the crank, but I have clouded both of your minds so you think things are what they are not.

News just in! People have started worshipping Chongo in Effigy. Effigy, South Dakota, that is. Crowds of accolytes have been gathering at the Shrine of Chongo and placing offerings of bananas. It's not clear what or who started off this cult, but it appears to be only a local phenomenon at present. The Apostolic Church of Chongo claims to have over 300 adherents in their growing congregation.

There are several renowned effigies in South Dakota (North, too, for that matter) but there is no town, city, village, hamlet, ghost town, collection of shacks, or crossroads named "Effigy" in either State.

Besides, I have not given Approval for such carryings-on. Perhaps you are confusing this naive idea with the annual motorcycle worship in Sturgis.

Your answer, Rap, proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that you are completely in the dark regarding the reality I speak of. This puts you in a condition usually described as "blissful ignorance", and I hope that you may derive much happiness from it. ;-)

Meanwhile, the Apostolic Church of Chongo is spreading like wildfire from Effigy, South Dakota all across the region, gaining converts by the thousands! Could this result in a Chongo presidency by acclamation in 2016?

All right, you asked for it! Just to show you that I AM the Master of All Creation here's one of my creations!!

Like most summer days, it was hot, sweaty, humid, and boring. There had been no rain for at least five or six days, the Fourth of July was past, the grass was brown, and all that there was to look forward to was school starting at the end of the August. Luckily, it was still July, so we still had some time to lay around and read and cut grass and play and go swimming and stuff.

Still, it was boring because we'd read all of the books we'd gotten from the library and the grass was cut and the weeding was done and we were tired of playing with each other and the swimming pool was closed.

"You know something?" said Tony one day. "This is really boring."

"We could have a fight," Ted suggested.

"Nah," I said, "we did that an hour ago and Mom said that if we did it again she'd Take Appropriate Action, and I don't want to find out what that means."

"Good thought," said Tony.

"Hey," said Ted, "let's go take a walk. Not a long one, like a hike or something, just a walk. We could go look around the southeast part of the northwest corner of the Swamp. We've never really looked around there much before."

"It's too hot," I said and Tony poured a whole glass of ice water down my back and said, "Not now, I bet!" and laughed and laughed and Ted joined him.

"Okay," I said resignedly, "let's go tell Mom we're going." And we did, and she just shook her head about my really wet back.

Off we went, a song in our hearts because the neighbors complained if we actually sang a song.

Once in the southwest part of the northwest corner of the Swamp we had to turn around because we were supposed to be in the southeast corner and naturally we blamed each other for getting us lost even though we really weren't. We just liked to blame things on each other.

Off we went in the southeast part of the northwest corner. It was very interesting, and Ted decided that we were probably the very first people who'd ever been in the part before. Tony disagreed. "Why do you think that we're not the first?" queried Ted. "I think we are."

"Because," Tony explained, "it would be very unlikely that a section of land (even though it's Swamp) wasn't explored at least by the Indians. And I think I can say with some assurance that there are Certain Signs that indicate that we aren't the first people here."

"Oh yeah?!" exclaimed Ted. "What sort of signs do your eagle-like eyes see that would lead you to think that, pray tell?"

"Little things," said Tony. "The way the grass grows, for one."

Ted sneered.

"The contours of land, for another."

Ted sneered again, but a lot more so.

"The fence you're sitting on, which has a sign on it says 'Tuttle's Terribly Tender Turkeys' and a road leading through the gate over there, for still another."

"Oh," said Ted, not sneering at all. "Oh. This good old fence and the good old sign. Well, I don't think that anyone else has been here for a very, very long time though."

"Oh, I agree about that," said Tony.

"Come on, you two," I interrupted. "Let's go up this old road and see what this is all about." And Ted jumped down off the fence and we set out up the old, overgrown road.

Sure enough, it was an old farm. The barn was falling down and the house had already fallen into the cellar. We looked around, poking into this building and that. There were several long buildings that we finally figured out must have been where the turkeys were raised. Certain clues led us to conclude this, the most important ones being the signs that said "Turkey House One" "Turkey House Two" and so on.

And it was obvious that the farm had once raised turkeys! There were signs for Tuttle's Terribly Tender Turkeys all over the place. There were even signs on the roof of the farm's old outhouse (we didn't go in there)!

Finally, we sat down on a rickety old bench in the shade of an old tree.

"You know," Ted said, "I think that this place was once owned by a family named Tuttle."

"Brilliant, Sherlock," I commented. "Positively brilliant."

"And they raised turkeys here."

I turned to Tony and said, in awe, "His brilliance outshines the sun."

"And the turkeys got loose and grew to enormous size, like maybe as much as fifteen feet tall."

"You're nuts," Tony and I said together.

"Then what made those tracks over there?" asked Ted, pointing.

Sure enough, on the ground not more than twelve feet twelve inches away were a row of tracks that had to have been made by a gigantic bird, probably a turkey!

"Dr. Edward Hitchcock, of Amherst College somewhere out East, like in Rhode Island or Vermont or somewhere else. He was a really top-notch scientist and when a local farmer brought him to see some tracks like these, Dr. Hitchcock said that he thought that they had been made by twelve-foot-high turkeys. And he collected a lot of footprints and became a Renowned Expert and always held that they were made by twelve-foot-high turkeys."

"Ah, just for the record, when was this?" I asked Tony.

"Around 1830, I think. But he lived a real long time! And he's very famous!"

Ted and I just shook our heads.

"OW!" shouted Tony.

"What's up with you?" I asked as he went "OW!" again.

"You pinched me. Hard!" he said.

"I did not! I was shaking my head in dis – OW! OW! Ted, cut that out!"

"Cut what OW! out?" asked Ted.

We were jumping around, slapping at whatever was pinching us or...and then I recognized it. We were being pecked!

"Hey, we're being pecked, not pinched!" I shouted.

"Well, it still hurts!" Ted yelled back. "So stop it!" And just then he was hit right in the face with a big ball of really squooshy mud!

"Whoa!" shouted Tony. "Let's get out of here!" And more balls of stinky, wet mud came flying at us!

We ran. We ran really fast, past the old turkey houses and past the old barn and past the old collapsed house and down the old overgrown road and out the gate and there we fell panting on the grass. The pecking had stopped and no more mud was being flung at us.

Slowly we got out breath back, and we walked over to a spring and had a long drink of cool water. Ted washed the nasty mud off his face and shirt and we set out for home.

When we got there, we asked Mom about Tuttle's Terribly Tender Turkeys. She explained that many, many years ago a family named Tuttle raised turkeys on a farm somewhere. They never told anyone where it was, because they wanted to keep their turkey-raising secrets secret. One day, they moved away, and the only reason they ever gave was that "the ghosts of the old turkeys wouldn't let us alone." And nobody had ever found their old farm, until we did, of course. And we didn't tell Mom or anyone because we felt that it was better that way.

Naturally, we talked about what had happened among ourselves. We even told Martha, who hadn't been there because she had been taking a course in Summer School, which we thought was a waste of summer. But she figured it out. She asked us a lot of questions, and finally we admitted that as we ran away we'd heard a sort of laughing "gobble gobble" sound around us. That made it clear to her that we had been attacked, like the Tuttles many years before, by poultrygeists.

Mom! Look at you! Hanging around the fiscal cliff and the GOP on your way back (or is it to?) that disreputable Tavern! Why, I do believe I detect the faint odor of alcohol on your breath...and clothing...and cane...and hat...and....

Hmmm. Well, in my reality, Rap, you ceased to exist around dawn this morning. You're just not there anymore. I realize you do exist in some other reality, and that's fine, but the fact that you're not in this one anymore is a bit disturbing. What shall we do about it?

Oh, and there is no such thing as "Mom" here either, in terms of this thread, I mean. The idea of a Mudcate thread being our "Mom" is a completely fallacious concept which has no bearing on reality. It doesn't hold water. It does not compute. "That dog won't hunt", to quote Bobert.

In short, my dear fellow, you and a few others here are engaging in a daily fantasy which makes my daily fantasies look profoundly real and substantial in comparison.